ILA students named Undergraduate Global Research Fellows

Two rising ILA seniors, Isha Soni and Imani Wright, have received $4000 travel fellowships from the Halle Institute for Global Research at Emory University. As Undergraduate Global Research Fellows, Imani and Isha will travel internationally, hopefully this summer, to conduct research for their senior honors theses. In the fall they will enroll in the Global Fellows Research Seminar, have access to shared office space in the Fox Center for Humanistic Inquiry, and present their research in a public forum organized by the Halle Institute and the Fox Center.

Isha Soni

Isha will be traveling to Istanbul, Turkey (covid permitting) to investigate the relationship between the rise in nationalism since 2016 and the education that refugees receive. She hopes to interview people who worked at NGOs during the time such organizations directed refugee education in Turkey. She will also examine plans for schooling in refugee camps after Turkey's decision to centralize refugee education. Her research seeks to understand the implications of education's status as a human right versus its use as a tool to craft a unified national identity.

Imani Wright

Imani plans to return to San Jose, Costa Rica, to conduct interviews at El Centro de Formacion Integral–Maria Madre de Los Pobres, a Catholic-run outreach center where she volunteered during her semester study abroad. Imani's honors thesis, which will address the impact of women’s empowerment on the social and economic aspects of sustainable development initiatives, will incorporate El Centro de Formacion Integral as a case study. She hopes to show how improving marginalized women's quality of life through the mission and methods of organizations like El Centro de Formacion Integral can contribute to and advance the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals.